Love your channel. And the restorations. Also, the education about older tools is a super great bonus!!! But it also makes me sad. Why don't we here in the US manufacture tools like we used to do??? I do know we have some manufacturing. However, we used to have many and varied tool manufactures. I do have one serious question. Why shellac for primer??? Why not Rust-Oleum, or another primer of that type??? I'm restoring my grandfather, and great grandfather's tools. My great grandfather had a working farm and small coal mine. He had a bunk house, blacksmith shop, and several barns. I have many, if not most of his tools. It's fun to put those tools back in working condition. I also do blacksmithing as a hobby. It's satisfying, but I'm not very good at it yet. But I intend to put all their tools into working condition.
Thank god you can talk I have started to watch 15 videos where the presenter doesn't talk yours is the first one that I have watched longer than the first 15 seconds and watched to the end thank you
Again great video, I like how you take time to explain how to use wire wheel, like in 2:25 you talk about how to angle in to keep the nureling(sp) thanks again my friend always look forward to seeing your videos. BTW I am looking around for some old tools from Indonesia here if I find I will send your way. Keep up the great videos
^someone who both realises the value of a good vice in the workshop and who values it also as a family piece. great job, your own grandchildren will get to enjoy it too
Never heard of a Monarch vise, but one look at those MILLED jaw faces told me you weren't wasting your time. I'll take a vise like that over ANYTHING being made today. Nice work.
Ricopolico - Thanks! It's a shame that many awesome vises and anvils found their way into scrap yards many years ago... It would have been great to save some of those beauties! I appreciate the feedback! 😃👍
You're right Scout. Many moons ago, after I just bought a good vise (of course), my buddy said I should have told him I needed a vise. He was a steel mill machinist and he said they were scrapping vises at his shop - old school 8" & 10" monsters. The kind of vise that you don't mount on a bench, but lag it to a butt chunk of red oak like an anvil and its sheer mass holds it in place. Maybe it was good I missed out on that - I didn't have a cherry picker to put it in place.
Ricopolico Wow! That's a killer! Another sad story- my buddy had this 80 pound high jaw vise he got from a bus company, it was about five inches wide but about ten inches high, a real beauty. Well hurricane Sandy flooded his home with salt water and a couple days later he saw the vise was all rusted and tossed it! 😩 I was sad because in only a few days it could only be surface rust and I could have made that vise sparkle once again... Sad right?! Thanks Ricopolico... 😃👍
Nice restoration of a beautiful piece of history. I have my grandfather's old Rock Island Tool Co. vise that I will be restoring. It looks very similar to your Monarch vise only bigger. Cheers!
Great job, the new paint along with the wear marks is beautiful. Congrats on retirement, I retired early due to my time in the Marine Corps, hated it at first but now its okay.
Thanks Mario! I was a little surprised too! I love the way tool makers of yesteryear took pride in making their products. We saved this one from the scrapyard! Thanks again! 😃👍
InformationIsTheEdge - This one was pretty beat up before, if I knew then what I do now I probably would have looked for a better candidate to start. Maybe it's like they say "It's not the destination, it's the journey" 😃. My Great Grandfather's vise will always be my favorite! Thanks much for stopping by and commenting! 😃👍
ScoutCrafter WOW! Thanks for the reply! For me your hard work was worth it because I think the finished product looks and works great! As you say, to be around for another 80 - 100 years.
Yes these videos are relaxing to watch. A nice hot bath, glass of wine and a vice being restored. As a way to destress after a busy day. Nothing better. Keep them coming. Thanks from the UK. X
Interested in why you used Shellac as a primer on this restoration but use a regular gray paint primer on the red vise you restored? Can't stop watching!
Hello GunPilot! Lol, Our 'someday' pile keeps getting bigger!!! This was one of my first vise restorations and the vise wasn't such a great starting candidate but it turned out useable... After this I learned to look for less chips and wear!!! Makes the restoration so much easier! Thanks very much!!!!!
Personally I would have run some diesel into the jaw screws, left them over night and then given it a go. Maybe with a little local heat too. While it's apart so long as you don't damage anything, curiosity satisfied!
Hey Ron! Be careful you don't get caught up in the vise bug like I did! 😊. You can't go wrong with a Chas Parker vise, they are really built well and very affordable! Just look for good jaws and that the 'anvil' of the vise wasn't used as an anvil! They make great weekend projects and I know in my shop the vise is the most used tool! Thanks for stopping by!! 😊👍
That was an early restoration and I must say that vise was in BAD shape! LOL Today I would pass on that one but looking back it was a fun learning experience! Thanks so much!!!!!!!!
Hey Mickey Mouse! Awesome! What's interesting is that many vise manufacturers made vises for a bunch of retailers. Also some vises weigh in at over 200 pounds! I've always been a fan of Sears/Craftsman products. Thanks much for stopping by! 😃👍
This is maybe the third restoration I've seen where you put a beautiful black enamel as the background, and then left, in this case, the lion's head unfinished. It's an excellent choice and is quite striking - it really makes the whole project look strong and elegant. On the jaw removal I'm sure you made the right call, but rhetorically if you had to get them off, would an impact bit be a good choice? (Maybe I don't have the correct name for the tool, but the kind where you tap/strike the anvil end with a hammer, and it twists the bit end). I ask for learning purposes!
took my Monarch mostly apart today.... the spindle is put on with a pin... with no way to remove it from the front jaw... not like the pin yours has.... think I can degrease it enough with brake or carb cleaner and a wire brush to paint it successfully? kind of bummed... I had a machinist look at it... and he said leave it together as well... said to just oil it and say done.... I already bought the paint.... any ideas?
Dante Poe - Hey Dante, Not a problem- you can still get a nice finish working with the spindle attached. One thing you will find is working with tools a century old is lots of times they were fixed or tweaked... At first it drives you crazy but later on you will see it as a challenge to work around. The pin that holds the spindle in was a weak design but now that yours is welded in it's no longer a problem! After you get the handle nice a cleaned up you can tape and paint no problem! Don't give up it will come out great!!!!
M24A6 - Great question- One thing I have found is that as long as you don't mess up the casting like going at it with a angle grinder you're golden. These vises were meant to be used and do get banged up but that's the beauty of them. Even if you paint it a color that YOU like it's no problem because five minutes in a dip tank and the paint is gone.. If you strip it down just make sure to clean it good and coat the metal either with paint, shellac or something that will keep the rust away. These vises work best when lubricated and used! Thanks for watching! 😃👍
Hello Pj O- These Monarch Vises dont command a lot of money because there are so many really good vises out there for sale... To someone like me who appreciates older vises it fills a void but I see these go for about $100 in decent shape. Mine was beat-up pretty bad and would not command as much. Thanks very much!!!!
Hi Mike, The Vise market has gone a little crazy in the past few years, I don't know why but I have seen crazy prices "asked" for restored vises (like $450)! To me that's just crazy. The way I figure it is a nice original vise can be found for between $50 and $100 then maybe another $100 for a decent restoration... That would be a fair price to me. Some people are nuts, they go to a flea market or yard sale, pick up a tool for $10 and ask $100 for it! Then they wonder why they never sell anything or always go home with the same overpriced junk they came with. The best sellers are the guys who pick up a tool for $10, give it a little cleaning and sell it for $20... Doubled their money with minimal effort and lots of fun! Thanks for stopping by!
Jusb1066 You're right! The shame of it is that some companies put out decent stuff and others put out garbage that only looks good! I had a friend that broke a vise only to find out it had a large crack from the factory that was filled with bondo! Now that's just wrong! 😃
Ha Ha! The lighting is good over my washing machine so I tend to use that area a lot for certain jobs... It's all in my basement and I know I need more room! 😃. Thanks for stopping by!
Stephen- The only problem with an oven is keeping the temperature low enough. The temperature on my old furnace is probably around 110° but very dry. The difficult part about enamel paint is that it cures from the inside out. ( I know that from all my fingerprints permanently engraved in my earlier work ). 😃 By warming up the part and the paint the finish comes out much better then spring either one at a separate temperature. Patience is the key with the enamel paint. After a few days sitting in a 90° temperature do you have to leave it in a cool area so the pain can harden on the outside. Is it possible for you to keep your oven at a very low temperature like it around 100° or under?
Lite Roadie - Hi! I don't think so- These vises were made by the Prentiss Vise Company... However the Monarch 10EE is one of the sweetest lathes ever made...!!! 😃👍
I'm surprised they didn't get sued for the name. I don't have any machine tools beside a small drill press but would sure like a lathe sometime! I've been watching a lot of machining channels like mrpete222 and Keith Fenner etc, reading forums and have learned a LOT about machine shop and machining practices and although I had no idea about anything before I can now comfortably talk to someone about lathes, know all the parts and am familiar with all the common operations. It sure will come in handy later when I hopefully get my hands on a lathe, and you never stop learning! I know about the 10EE from forums and understand it is a bit of a ''cream of the crop'' machine, along with the Hardinge HLV? Certainly a lot of snobbery around them too.
Lite Roadie LOL! You are sure right about the snobbery!!! 😃. Thru the years I have had the opportunity to meet some amazing craftsmen and I have always found the more talented they are the more humble they are too! Like anything else the more we learn the more we realize how little we know. If ever you feel like you want to learn some machining I don't think you can go wrong with a small 7x10 or 7x14 lathe. You can get a nice one at Little Machine Shop. I have had many hours of fun on mine. Thanks for watching and commenting! 😃👍
Great job getting that bend out of the handle. Really important stuff there. And its good you didnt bother removing the jaws. Its not like someone will want to switch them out with smooth or soft jaws. Also neat you didnt show any actual work. 10/10
Hey Stephen, Normally I would but with this vise I tried heat and heavy torque and the screws weren't budging! The Parker Vises had their Jaws held on by pins, I have a video on that vise- much easier. I figured that if I stripped the screw heads I would have to drill them out and that would be a job in itself. This was a beat-up vise that didn't warrant all the extra work- You know the expression "You can put lipstick on a pig....". 😃
A good result , brilliant looking vice, or vise. The other expression is if its not broke don't fix it, or can't make a silk purse out of a sows ear. I have also had trouble taking out the jaw bolts. Ended up chewing the heads up.
If you do take them off, use an impact screw driver. No, not a little 1/4 impact that goes with your drill, one that you hit with a hammer. It puts just as much force inward as it does into turning it so the likelihood of stripping it out is almost 0.
Hey Keyser- For the last 17 years I have worked midnights and it's almost impossible to change your schedule on your days off so we pasty White night-walkers wander around at 4am trying to get tired before our nemesis the sun appears and tries to foil our sleep yet another day. 😋 Good news- I retire in 4 months and then I will join the human race once again and see that beautiful Yellow ball in the sky once again! 😃👍
ScoutCrafter, I know what you mean, I use to work the night shift in the military for many years. I just retired from the Army not to long ago. I noticed even when my duty shift was over at 0900 hours I still wanted to stay up. I like that Craftsman bench grinder you have there. I just purchased the same one off of eBay to start restoring some old vises and stuff just like you do, of course watching your videos for some very good pointers. Excellent job on your videos ScoutCrafter!
Hi Peter! I'm glad to hear you retired! I retire next month! That Craftsman bench buffer is great- My father picked that up years back. I got the arbors and various wire brushes at Harbor Freight. You can also get buffing pads there. I'm sure you will have a good time with your restorations, it's a great feeling to bring something back to life! Thanks for commenting! 😃👍
